By any other name: portrayals of autism across international film remakes

Abstract

This study is the first to approach the social theory of disability through film remakes, a technique that permits a novel comparative examination of the construction of autism in different countries. Two American films about characters with autism were compared to their respective Indian Hindi-language remakes by means of a quantitative content analysis. Analysis revealed differences in how disability was constructed across the original films and their remakes, indicating the influence of culture on the construction of disability. Specifically, the Indian remakes depicted characters with autism in more romantic interactions, interactions with children, and with more occupational abilities than the original American films. Religion also featured more in the Indian films in relation to autism. These findings are important because they extend application of social theory to autism, lending insight into the social construction of autism as a disability and, by extension, aiming for the transformation of people with autism.

Keywords:

• Disability in the media
• film remakes
• autism
• social model of disability
• content analysis

Acknowledgement

Thanks so much to Dr. Tara M. Mortensen at the University of South Carolina for her time and patient guidance.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.